A sense of war, pride and love

Student and soldier - Millie Burton and Richard Mead.

They're precious ANZAC Day moments. Moments that linger long after.

Hairs on necks bristled as two Harvard airplanes roared across Memorial Park at 1000 feet. And hearts ached as a maudlin bugle call drifted on a new dawn at Mount Maunganui. And across town a 17-year-old Aquinas College student held another Anzac audience spellbound.

'Loved it,” says Jan Garrett, chair of the Carmel Country Estate residents committee. 'There were tears in my eyes” says another. Who they loved was Millie Burton. And what they loved was her understanding of war and sacrifice.

'I didn't want them to think I knew how they were feeling. Because I have no idea” says the year 13 student.

'I just wanted them to know how much I appreciated their sacrifices, what they have delivered for us. And I will tell my children and they will tell their children. It's that great sense of national pride we have in New Zealand.”

Millie was invited to talk to about 150 friends and family at an Anzac Day service at the retirement village. She was the youngest by more than half a century. And those she addressed had lived through wars, lost family in wars, and at least one man, Richard Mead, his chest heavy with medals, had been to war.

'My great grandfather Jack served in two world wars. He was lucky he came home” says Millie. 'A lot of people my age have great grandfathers and great uncles who fought, so it is very personal to us. It hasn't gone. It is still very relevant and we feel it.”

She also thinks it's very important children continue to be taught about it so they fully understand the effects of war on soldiers, families and countries. I think it's really cool. I just think Anzac Day is such a really cool day for New Zealand.”

Her audience thought it was 'really cool” too. They needed to know that, they still needed to feel appreciated.

Millie Burton has studied war – the holocaust, Nazism and Vietnam. 'It was shocking the way those men were treated.”

She hasn't been impacted by war but she has a sense of war. On a school trip she has trod the ridges and trench lines of Messines, the Belgian battlefield south of Ypres where 700 New Zealand soldiers died and another 3000 were injured.

'At about six o'clock in the evening I went for a walk across a field. The sun was setting and it cast a beautiful glow over the hills and ridges of Messines.” Millie Burton was transporting her audience to a far off battlefield and they hung on her every word.

'I walked towards a tall cross perched on a hill and surrounded with white plaques. What caught my eye was the silver fern etched on white stone with the words ‘Here are the names of the men and officers of New Zealand who fell at Messines and whose graves are known only to God'.”

She says it was beyond her comprehension that across the other side of the earth, our soldiers, our blood, our fathers, our brothers, our grandfathers and great grandfathers, our heroes were being recognised for their service.

'Being able to physically see and understand where these men fought, the conditions and the climate they had to battle was mind blowing. As Divisional Commander Sir Andrew Russell said, the mud is a worse enemy than the German. The fear and the loneliness these men must have felt is something I will never be able to understand.”

And she was shocked by a passage from a personal diary written by a young Irish soldier called Patrick McGill. 'I wish I were back in the glens of Donegal. But they'll call me coward if I return, but a hero only if I fall.”

Millie says they were the words of a man parted from his loved ones and whose life had been turned upside down. And yet he knew the only way he could be at peace and to be deemed a hero was to die for his country.

'I walked away from those graves and memorials with a new found sense of understanding – that to me Anzac Day isn't about history or the politics of war. It's about remembering the supreme sacrifice so many of our men made.

'It's not about remembering military successes or failures. It's about patriotism and national pride and, frankly, Anzac Day keeps that alive. Our fallen men have taught us we all have one thing in common and that is we can proudly stand should to shoulder celebrating the love we have for New Zealand.”

About 150 senior New Zealanders and one 17-year-old Aquinas College student stood shoulder to shoulder at a retirement village on Tuesday. There was a lot of love and pride.

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1 comment

Very nice story

Posted on 30-04-2017 15:59 | By Papamoaner

Fantastic photograph too. Those facial expressions speak volumes. Neat bit of journalism Sunlive.


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